Here come the Brown and White Wrestle-offs

Of The Morning Call

When are the Lehigh University wrestle-offs taking place?

Lehigh University's wrestling team returns three All-Americans, but none of them are expected to be competing 7 p.m. today when the Mountain Hawks host the annual preseason Brown and White wrestle-offs at Grace Hall.

Junior Mason Beckman, sixth at 133 at nationals last season, has been invited to Saturday's NWCA All-Star Classic at the University of Pennsylvania's Palestra against fourth-place finisher A.J. Schopp of Edinboro in a rematch of last year's 133-pound bout at the Classic.

Because Beckman is looking to peak for Saturday, he won't be wrestling.

In addition, Bethlehem Catholic graduate Darian Cruz, who placed seventh at 125 nationals last season, is expected to defer his eligibility for a year. Mitch Minotti, a sophomore who placed sixth at 149 at the NCAA Championships, is out of the lineup for now following preseason surgery, as is projected 285-pounder Max Wessell.

"I'd like to give you a lineup, but quite frankly a lot of it is up in the air," Lehigh head coach Pat Santoro said on Tuesday. "I'm not making predictions because we've got to figure out what it is."

Wrestle-offs are just one of the criteria that Santoro and his coaching staff, which includes Brad Dillon, John Hughes and newcomer Jarrod Garnett, use.

"Everything is a wrestle-off," Santoro said. "The wrestle-off is a wrestle-off. Going to class is a wrestle-off. Being on time is a wrestle-off. How you do in open competition when you have a chance to compete against opponents who aren't teammates is a wrestleoff."

The first open tournament of the season takes place Sunday with the Clarion Open.

While tonight's action is the first public viewing of the wrestlers in a competition mode, the first meet takes place 7 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 6, when Lehigh hosts Hofstra, which is in the EIWA for the second straight season.

The schedule gets really hairy three days later when the Mountain Hawks travel to University Park to take on four-time NCAA defending champion Penn State in a 2 p.m. match Sunday, Nov. 9.

Lehigh isn't home again until Saturday, Dec. 6, when the team hosts Penn at 2 p.m., and then Rider at 2 p.m. the next day.

The Mountain Hawks return home Jan. 24 to host F&M, followed by a Jan. 25 match with EIWA power Cornell. After a home double dual with Harvard and Brown on Feb. 8, the Mountain Hawks will host a first round national duals match against George Mason.

Lehigh kicks off the championship season by hosting the EIWA Championships March 6-7. The season concludes March 19-21 with the NCAA Division I Championships in St. Louis.

One of the definite wrestle-offs will take place at 165 pounds, where a pair of incoming graduate students will display their talents in Brown and White for the first time.

Marshall Peppelman, a Cornell University graduate from Harrisburg (Central Dauphin), will take on Santiago Martinez, who was a two-time NCWA (club wrestling) champion and three-time finalist at the University of Central Florida.

At 125, Scott Parker, a freshman from Pennridge, is expected to take on sophomore Jonathan Mele, a transfer from Clarion.

2012-13 EIWA champion Nate Brown (184) returns to action after deferring his eligibility last year and will most likely wrestle-off with freshman Garrett Stehley of Lowell, Mich.